Youngbee Dale

WASHINGTON, May 10, 2012 — China’s one child policy, baby trafficking, and sex trafficking of North Korean women aren’t the worst human rights violation happening in the country. Aborting innocent and healthy unborn children and eating them to boost one’s stamina and sexual health is.

South Korean customs officials recently seized thousands of pills filled with powdered human baby flesh arriving from China. Since August 2011, South Korean officials have intercepted more than 17000 pills smuggled from China.

South Korean officials became aware of a horrific practice of eating aborted fetuses after Seoul Broadcasting System showed a documentary on Chinese doctors who performed abortions and then ate the fetuses. One Chinese doctor on the documentary took out fetuses from his refrigerator

Earlier this week, the Daily Mail revealed further details about the practice:

“The grim trade is being run from China where corrupt medical staff are said to be tipping off medical companies when babies are aborted or delivered still-born.

“The tiny corpses are then bought, stored in household refrigerators in homes of those involved in the trade before they are removed and taken to clinics where they are placed in medical drying microwaves.

“Once the skin is tinder dry, it is pummeled into powder and then processed into capsules along with herbs to disguise the true ingredients from health investigators and customs officers.”

Chinese authorities denied allegations that the pills were manufactured in China. A Ministry of Health spokesman stated that an investigation conducted last August showed no proof that pills containing human flesh were manufactured in China.

Reports show that the South Korean customs officials aren’t the first ones to witness such a gruesome human rights violation by the Chinese. In 2007, Hong Kong based Next Magazine reported that infant fetuses had became a popular health and beauty supplement in China. In Guangdong, the demand for fetus’s body parts was so high that buyers purchased them directly at the hospitals.

One writer says that in China, reports about meals made from infant flesh surface from time to time. An online video clips on Chinese cannibalism contains the introduction that “eating human flesh is an art form.”

In 1995, one human rights advocate recorded allegation of doctors eating dead fetus after performing abortions at Shenzhen hospitals. To confirm the allegation, an undercover reporter from Eastern Express visited a state owned health center for women and children and asked a female doctor for a fetus. The doctor said that the hospital was out of stock but reminded the reporter to come back. When the reporter went back to the hospital, the doctor offered ten fetuses for free.

In another state-run hospital in Shenzhen, a nurse said that fetuses were in short supply and the price could go up from $10 to $20. In another clinic, one doctor offered the reporter a full-term fetus and recommended that it had the best healing ingredients.

The disturbing human rights abuse comes from a distorted view of unborn children in Chinese culture. Traditionally, ancient Chinese considered ingestion of firstborns, aborted fetuses and placentas as part of a mother’s flesh. An unborn child has no personhood of his or her own. Hence, mothers believed that they were theirs to reabsorb to create a new, healthier baby. This type of belief is common in societies practicing cannibalistic infanticide.

Chinese folk tradition says that placenta consumption helps increase the supply of sperm, and in traditional Chinese medicine it is believed to support blood supply.

Consumption of fetuses and full-term infants is a horrific, vile practice against humanity. The Chinese government must step up efforts to end the practice

Youngbee Dale is a writer, researcher, and human rights advocate. She invites you to join her on Google+, Facebook, or Twitter.

TIBETANIAN FOOD IS NORMAL COMPARED TO CHINESE FOOD

Tibetanian Cuisine, Food & Recipes

Tibetan cuisine reflects local customs and climate and few crops grow at the high altitudes that characterises much of Tibet. However, there are a few areas in Tibet are low enough to grow rice, oranges, bananas, and lemon.

Flour milled from roasted barley, locally called tsampa, is the staple food of Tibet. Balep is the Tibetan bread eaten for breakfast and lunch. Thukpa consists of noodles of various shapes, vegetables and meat in broth, mainly consumed at dinner. In contrast to other Himalayan cultures, Tibetan dishes are traditionally served with bamboo chopsticks. Small soup bowls are also used

Meat dishes are yak, goat, or mutton – often dried, or cooked in a spicy stew with potatoes. Mustard seed is cultivated in Tibet, and is liberally used in its recipes.

Yak yoghurt, butter and cheese are regularly eaten. Some Tibetan dishes are also consumed in Ladakh, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, various regions of northern Nepal and by Tibetan exiles in India.

Recipes for crueltyShanghai Star. 2004-02-19

CHINESE are renowned around the world for their love of food, sometimes strange food. The SARS outbreak last year led to great criticism of Chinese, especially Cantonese, over some of their unique dining “customs”. The condemnation centred on the eating of various animals, especially wild ones, that other peoples could never imagine themselves eating – for example, mice and cats.

“However, that doesn’t mean that all Chinese do things the same way,” said Jiang Liyang, a gastronome in Shanghai who has been studying Chinese history and dining. “But Chinese people really do lack an awareness when it comes to protecting animals,” he said.

People in most regions in China today are eating “normal” food but in ancient times a series of “cruel” dishes were created which did involve the torture of animals. Some of them would astonish modern Chinese.

According to the level of cruelty, nine dishes were on this menu. The cruelest one was when a group of diners sat down to consume the brain of a live monkey.

A small table was prepared for the diners with a hole in the centre, the same size as a monkey’s head. The live monkey was fastened under the table with part of its head showing through the hole. The hair on its head was shaved and the skull was cut open. The monkey would begin to squeal with pain as seasonings and oil were sprinkled onto the brain and diners around the table ladled sections of the brain onto their plates. It was considered a delicious dish.

“Chinese people trust in the idiom that ‘A thing is valued if it is rare,’ so that some thought eating strange and precious things showed their wealth and social status,” Jiang said.

People today don’t have easy access to this dish any more but a very few still try to eat it in secret, Jiang said.

The diners would order mice that had just been born and a plate of sauce. The baby mouse would scream first when a diner seized it with a pair of chopsticks. It would scream a second time when it was dipped into the seasonings and its last scream was emitted as it entered the diner’s mouth.

Some Cantonese still eat mice because they believe mouse meat is rich in protein. This was confirmed by Jiang, but he said mouse meat was also dangerous because it contained a lot of bacteria.

“SARS was actually not caused by civet cats but by mice,” he asserted. “People in what is now East China’s Anhui Province in the Song Dynasty (960-1279) were the first to eat civets.”

He recalled that in his childhood around 1949, a Cantonese vendor came to Shanghai, swapping Cantonese dim sum for mice caught by locals.

Painful but tasty

Another “cruel dish” concerned the carving up of a live donkey, a practice, Jiang said, that still persists among farmers in some villages in Henan and Hebei provinces.

The legs and head of a donkey were held by cords fixed to five poles. The diners could choose meat from whichever part of the donkey they wanted.

A butcher would pour boiling water onto the part selected, remove the hair and cut the meat off while the donkey was still alive. The process was similar to an ancient torture called “ling chi”, to put a person to death by slow dismemberment.

It’s said that Cixi, the notorious Dowager Empress at the end of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1912), was fond of eating roasted duck’s claws.

The duck would be placed on an iron plate over a fire lit below and the duck would begin jumping as the heat became unbearable. It would also become thirsty and diners would give it soy bean oil to drink so that the claws would be flavoured when cut off for eating.

Cixi’s favourite part of the dish was the thin layer of skin on the bottom of the duck’s feet. She usually had this dish when eating a hot pot dinner.

Other dishes on the “cruel list” included “zui xia” (shrimps in alcohol) where the “drunken” shrimps were eaten alive and “feng gan ji” (wind-dried chicken) where the belly of a chicken was opened while it was alive and its insides removed and seasonings inserted.

Chinese seemed to be willing to go to any lengths to obtain a delicacy. Jiang said that one ancient dynasty was even overthrown by soldiers lured by a list of delicious food that the rebels would serve them after victory.

“People in Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangdong and Guangxi in the south are used to eating strange things,” Jiang said.

One of the most famous was the Cantonese soup, “long hu dou” (tiger fighting with dragon), made from cat and snake meat which were nicknamed “little tiger and little dragon”.

The Yunnan people used to eat a sort of paste made from the eggs of ants. It has been proved that eating ants can be good for the health but the dish looks disgusting.

“We used to believe that wild animals were more tasty than domesticated poultry or pigs. It’s not true. There was a greater possible of spreading viruses among people,” Jiang said.

However, he believes that the torture of animals was never part of mainstream Chinese cuisine as sometimes alleged by Westerners.

And the West is not entirely innocent either. “Western people who like goose liver are also guilty of badly treating geese, force-feeding them continuously to fatten only the liver,” he said.

Chinese official urges interracial marriage

Monday, 1 September 2014

Chen Quanguo at the ethnic intermarriage family forum

Chinese government encourages Chinese people to marry Tibetans to quell resistance

State backed media in the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) are encouraging Tibetans and Chinese to marry and have published reports with policies favourable towards mixed-race couples.

Interracial marriages are offered various benefits such as better education, employment and Communist Party membership. They are also exempt from the one child policy.

Communist Party Chief and top official of the TAR, Chen Quanguo, has been actively promoting mixed marriages and has called on other government officials to promote this policy as a way of celebrating Chinese culture and encouraging “ethnic unity”. On 18 June he chaired the ethnic intermarriage family forum.

Colonization of Tibet

Tsering Woeser, a Tibetan writer and activist believes that this policy is another part of China’s colonization of Tibetans. Woeser, who is married to a Chinese man, believes that there’s nothing wrong with interracial marriages but it is wrong when the government uses it as a political tool.

Tibetans fear that this policy will play a part in diminishing their culture and traditions.

Forced to choose Chinese

Parents in interracial marriages have to choose whether their children will be Chinese or Tibetan on official registers. A source told the Washington Post that mixed parents often give their children Chinese names and choose to send their children to schools in China, which are much better than in Tibet.

Tibetan children

China’s decision to replace Tibetan with Chinese in Tibetan schools has resulted in thousands of Tibetan students protesting. Students, some as young as 12, carried banners in both Chinese and Tibetan calling for “Equality for Nationalities” and “Expand the Use of the Tibetan Language” and “Freedom for the Nationalities.”

His Holiness the Dalai Lama with a group of Chinese intellectuals at the SIno-Tibetan conference in Hamburg, Germany. Photo: TPI

Hamburg – The Sino-Tibetan Conference «Finding Common Ground» concluded in Hamburg, Germany, on 1 September 2014 after having a direct and open discussions and exchanges on the issue of Tibet. The participants from 15 countries who took part at the Conference released a statement of consensus of the conference listed several points including the need to hold the conference «Finding Common Ground» annually.

“Over 70 participants and observers from 15 countries from Europe, the USA, Australia, Asia and Mainland China attended the conference,” the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) said, adding: it is a “Tibetan initiative to set in motion a process of exchange, interaction, cooperation and joint efforts between Tibetans and Chinese stakeholders in the pursuit of a peaceful and just resolution of the Tibet issue.”

His Holiness the Dalai Lama the spiritual leader of Tibet met the participants of the conference and made clear that he had always encouraged Tibetans to reach out to Chinese brothers and sisters. In his address at the meeting, he expressed his hope to serve Mainland Chinese Buddhists through Buddhist teachings and the promotion of secular ethics. He also reiterated his longstanding wish to go on a pilgrimage to Wu Tai Shan – a sacred mountain in China for Buddhists.

In conjunction with His visit to Hamburg, His Holiness the Dalai Lama graced the participants with an audience and said, “I give special attention to contacts between the Chinese and Tibetan people and strongly support it. In the 1950s, I had expressed my wish to go to Mount Wutai Shan for a pilgrimage which has not yet materialized, but I still have the desire to go there for a pilgrimage”. His Holiness the Dalai Lama further said, “President Xi Jinping said that Buddhism has an important role to play in reviving Chinese culture. Being a Buddhist I can definitely make my contribution to this.”

Welcoming all participants, Kalon Dicki Chhoyang, Head of Department for Information and International Relations of the CTA, elaborated on the basic features of the Umaylam – the Middle Way Approach – adopted democratically by the Tibetan people as a policy in seeking a peaceful resolution of the issue of Tibet.

She said the ‘Tibet issue is related with the survival of a nationality and the preservation and promotion of its unique identities. The resolution of the Tibet issue is directly related to the interest of China.”

In his keynote address, Sikyong Dr Lobsang Sangay, the democratically-elected Tibetan political leader, stressed that “in the long history of peaceful and harmonious relations between Tibet and China, the present tragic state of affairs represents an aberration and exception. This aberration is the consequence of the military occupation of Tibet. The Middle Way Approach represents a realistic and pragmatic way to re-establish genuine friendship and peaceful coexistence between Tibet and China.”

“We are encouraged by the Chinese conference participants’ sincere wish to contribute towards restoring freedom and peace in Tibet. We are aware that the Chinese people are subjected to intense Chinese official propaganda and misinformation on Tibet. Despite this, this conference demonstrates there are many Chinese individuals who believe in truth and justice,” Sikyong said after the Chinese participants expressed their support for the Middle Way Approach.

Chinese participants expressed their respect and deep appreciation for Tibetan culture, Buddhism as well as for His Holiness the Dalai Lama. According to them “a peaceful resolution of the Tibet issue is not only the concern of the Tibetans but that it has great relevance in which direction China as a whole moves forward.” Consequently, unanimous support for the Middle Way Approach was expressed in a separate statement issued by the Chinese participants. Moreover, Chinese participants stressed the importance of making more information on Tibet in Chinese language available and using modern communication more effectively in reaching out to a wider Chinese audience.

Ms Li Jianglin, scholar on history, in her presentation, delineated the evolution of the nationality policy of the Chinese Communist Government. In the beginning the Chinese Communist accepted and supported the right of people to self-determination. They had the right to choose to join the Federation of China. But gradually they have changed this policy, disregarded the right to self-determination and deleted these from official documents.

The conference which convened by the Tibetan administration based in Dharamshala, India came to the following consensus:

– to support the efforts of the CTA for dialogue with the Chinese Government; the participants gave high appreciation to the ongoing contacts between the Chinese and Tibetan people and considered it important for their aspirations;– to make efforts that Sino-Tibetan people-to-people dialogue should not be limited to the political sphere, but also include areas of religion, culture and arts;– to acknowledge that the issue of Tibet is not just the problem of Tibetans, but it has also relevance to the future of both the Chinese and Tibetan people;– to express grave concerns about the serious human rights violations in Tibet and the deteriorating legal system, democratic development and human rights situation in China;– to unanimously express recognition and support for the policy of the Middle Way Approach;– to acknowledge the conference “Finding Common Ground” very meaningful and express that such meetings should be convened annually. It was agreed to form a working group of Tibetans and Chinese for that.

Undated image of Tulku PhurbuTsering Rinpoche, also known as Pangrina Rinpoche. Photo: TPI

Dharamshala: – Trulku Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche, a senior Buddhist figurefrom Karze County in eastern Tibet, has been found recently in serious condition at a Chinese prison. India based Tibetan rights group is gravely concerned about his well being,’ and says ‘the actual cause of his imprisonment remains unclear.’

An eyewitness who says he saw the 57-year-old Tibetan monk, whose religious name is Lobsang Tenzin Yeshe Trinley by chance early this month while visiting another prisoner at Mianyang Prison, located about two hours from Chengdu city. “At first I couldn’t recognize him as he had become so weak, almost emaciated,” said the source. “It looks like he is not being treated well in prison.”

The source said that local Tibetans have expressed deep concern and anxiety over Rinpoche’s deteriorating health, which they believe is caused by the severe condition he is subjected to in prison.

The Tibetan monk came under the surveillance of the Chinese police in May 2008, when he was suspected of having links with a peaceful protest march conducted by more than 80 nuns of Pangrina Nunnery on 14 May 2008 in Su-ngo Township in Karze County.

The nuns were protesting the implementation of the ‘patriotic education’ campaign at their nunnery. Following the protest, 55 nuns were arrested. Many were severely beaten by the security forces before being bundled away in military trucks.

Four days later, on 18 May 2008, at about 4.30 am (Beijing Standard Time), the Chinese security officers surrounded his residence and arrested Rinpoche without giving any reason. He was 53 at the time. For several months he disappeared and nobody knew how he was being treated, where he was being held, or why he had been arrested.

At the same time, more than 2000 Chinese security forces launched a crackdown on Ya-tseg Nunnery and Pangrina Nunnery, subjecting the nuns to severe restrictions and control. He was the chief spiritual preceptor and the head of Pangrina and Ya-tseg nunneries located in Karze.

Information about Rinpoche only became available on 23 December 2009, when an Intermediate People’s Court at Dartsedo (Ch: Kangding) County sentenced him to eight years and six months for possession of weapons. However, Li Fangping and Jiang Tianyong, two prominent Chinese civil rights lawyers who defended Rinpoche had said that serious violations of Chinese law occurred during his case and that the charges against him “lack factual clarity and sufficient evidence”.

Li Fangping told the Associated Press that Rinpoche was framed. During his disappearance, Rinpoche was reportedly tortured for four days and nights and forced into making a confession during interrogation. Police even threatened his wife and son of detention if he did not comply.

“Chinese authorities accused Rinpoche of indulging in separatist activities, when he led the monks and nuns of Yatseg Nunnery and Pangri-na Nunnery organize a life-long prayer ceremony (Tib: Tenshug) for His Holiness the Dalai Lama in 2002. The nuns moreover opposed the ‘patriotic education’ campaigns conducted in their nunnery, refusing to sign on the documents condemning His Holiness the Dalai Lama,” said the source.

Tibetan Centre for Human Rights & Democracy TCHRD based in India called on Chinese government to release prisoner Phurbu Tsering from Mianyang Chinese prison after his health condition seriously deteriorated as a result of his exposure to severe torture.

“We call upon the Special Rapporteur on torture, and other cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment, the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, and the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention to investigate the causes of Rinpoche’s detention and his subsequent treatment,” the group said, adding: “Furthermore, we urge the Special Rapporteurs and Working Group to raise the arbitrary detention of Rinpoche for his religious beliefs and his torture with the Chinese government.”

The group said that ‘the actual cause of his imprisonment remains unclear, however, sources inside Tibet say that the arrest may have had to do with his unwavering faith in His Holiness the Dalai Lama.’

Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche was born on 2 January 1957 to Tsewang Dargye and Yangchen Lhamo at Chigring Village of Serkhar Township in Kardze County, the area known to Tibetans as Kham Tehor (Chinese: Ganzi, Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province). He is the patron of Pangrina and Yatseg nunneries, which house 100 and 60 nuns respectively. Rinpoche was also engaged in charity works such as building old people’s homes and hospitals for local Tibetan population in Karze. His unwavering faith in His Holiness the Dalai Lama coupled with his charity work earned him much appreciation and praise from the local Tibetan community.

CHRD’s new report on ‘Ending Impunity: Crimes Against Humanity in Tibet’

The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy commemorates the 53rd anniversary of Tibetan Democracy Day, by releasing a report titled Ending Impunity: Crimes Against Humanity in Tibet. On 2 September, Tibetans all over the world celebrate the Tibetan Democracy Day. This latest report from TCHRD focuses on international criminal justice and argues that the conduct of high-level Chinese government officials in Tibet constitutes ‘crimes against humanity’.

This report demonstrates that even though the International Criminal Court (ICC) lacks jurisdiction to investigate the situation in Tibet, the Party officials of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) have committed crimes against humanity in Tibet. The ICC’s lack of jurisdiction does not change the nature of crimes committed in Tibet. The inability of the ICC to investigate the situation in Tibet does not mean there is no role for international criminal justice in Tibet. Recognising that international crimes defined by the Rome Statute have been committed in Tibet gives international actors powerful legal and rhetorical tools outside of the ICC.

TCHRD believes that the goal of international criminal justice in ending impunity is not dependent solely on action from the ICC. When the ICC cannot act, the international community can rise to the occasion. The international community can work to end impunity in Tibet by initiating criminal prosecutions and imposing targeted sanctions.

This report begins by discussing the jurisdictional hurdles faced by Tibetans at the ICC and then the substantive law of crimes against humanity and attribution for those crimes in Tibet. It then examines the commission of crimes against humanity through the development of plan to commit torture, arbitrary detention, and murder in Tibet. The report focuses on the criminal responsibility of six current and former Party Secretaries for Tibet Autonomous Region, Qinghai Province, Gansu Province, and Sichuan Province. It examines methods of ending the impunity these officials currently enjoy other than prosecution at an international court. The report concludes by discussing different means of accountability for the crimes committed in Tibet and issues policy recommendations to the PRC and the international community aimed at improving conditions in Tibet and ending impunity for those responsible for the commission of crimes against humanity.